


Tomorrow's Dust

by i_claudia



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Angst, Enemies, M/M, Secret Relationship, World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-16
Updated: 2011-10-16
Packaged: 2017-11-05 21:45:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/411329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/i_claudia/pseuds/i_claudia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His mother does not know or does not choose to speak of it. The neighbors, for all their spying, their peeking behind closed shutters opened only the merest of cracks, see nothing. It is only Merlin himself who carries this secret, layered within, lodged as a knife in his breast.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tomorrow's Dust

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on LJ [here](http://i-claudia.livejournal.com/78624.html). (16 October 2011)
> 
> Because one WWII AU was not enough, clearly. This fic has a bit of an experimental style; apologies and deepest regards/regrets to Irène Némirovsky.

They don’t speak of the war. How can they? How, when neighbors and brothers and sons are held prisoner far away—when enemy boots walk the streets in their place?

_Enemy_ ; the enemy—Merlin knows this, feels the nausea of it deep within his being, sometimes more than he can bear. Often he cannot face the eyes of his countrymen—of anyone—he is no longer a patriot, no longer a citizen; how can he be a Frenchman when he has allowed himself to be tempted, allowed himself to be drawn so far from where his love and loyalty should lie? He wonders if this is what collaboration means; which moral will he compromise next, for isn’t this how it begins, isn’t this how every Judas is led astray?—the wink of silver and the soft curve of smiling lips are equal currency in this trade of lies and broken honor. 

His mother does not know or does not choose to speak of it. The neighbors, for all their spying, their peeking behind closed shutters opened only the merest of cracks, see nothing. It is only Merlin himself who carries this secret, layered within, lodged as a knife in his breast.

He does not look at the picture of his father anymore, the photo he had stared at for hours as a boy, wishing for a uniform of his own, that he might avenge the few memories he holds, that he might prove himself equal as a man. His mother still tends the picture as religiously as she might the shrine of a saint, burning a few of their precious candles in front of the frame, which she has draped in black crepe and a single red, blue, and white ribbon, but Merlin can no longer bear to look at it.

So no, they do not speak of the war. The villagers do not speak to the Germans at all if they can help it. But Merlin was lured out of that reticence early, hopelessly fascinated, snared easily in Arthur’s thrall. How could he have avoided it? He had fought until a German bullet had sent him home, nearly sent him to the grave, and by the time the fever and infection had abated Paris had been taken, all had turned to chaos, and then, slowly, to resignation. When the Germans arrived in the village he was still weak, too weak to be sent anywhere—too weak to harden his heart against the soldier who had entered his house—and when he had regained his strength Arthur had spoken for him.

_Spoken for him_ , as if Merlin were nothing more than an extension of the occupied soil that bore him.

Arthur does not know about the forbidden gun Merlin has buried, hidden away beneath the pear tree, just as he does not know about the provisions and valuables Mme. Emrys had secreted away about the property before the enemy ever set his booted foot in her home. The discovery of the cured hams would perhaps bring about frowns and a slap on the wrist; a serious offense but one they could smooth over with some effort. The gun...Discovery of the gun would see Merlin executed, certainly. It makes Merlin’s heart race faster when Arthur sits beneath the tree, his long legs sprawled in front of him as he sits on his green cape, petals falling to be caught gently in his blond hair—and perhaps Arthur attributes the racing heartbeat to other factors, but Merlin can only think that beneath them, not two feet away, lies a gun which has killed Arthur’s comrades, just as Merlin is sure the pistol at Arthur’s hip has killed his own countrymen. It is not the same pistol Arthur’s father had carried, and Merlin is glad—he would never sleep again for wondering if it fired the bullet which took his own father away.

:::

The affair had begun innocently enough. Merlin had been in the garden, enjoying the first truly warm air of spring, his injuries easier to bear in the damp sunlight, and Arthur had encountered him there, had noticed the book he was reading. Arthur spoke passable French, had inquired about the book, and Merlin, caught in surprise and the heady scent of green earth, had answered. They had not spoken before that: Arthur had only been the enemy, one of an entire regiment meant to be billeted in the village, meant to drive prices up and invade the very homes and hearths of their new conquest. Merlin had only been an invalid, once a soldier but now beneath notice apart from a wary look and careful instructions— _verboten...verboten...verboten..._ —everything now was forbidden. At first, as he had gained strength, he had resented it, but had still been too delirious with memories to consider true resistance.

Arthur had never given any sign that he heard Merlin crying out in the night, caught in the brimstone confusion of his dreams, though Merlin had known he must wake at the noise. The walls were thin in the old house. Merlin himself had heard Arthur’s heavy tread late at night, pacing the floor in the room he occupied. But they had not spoken of it: that, too, was _verboten_.

They had spoken of authors instead, and of music, and of theater—Merlin had never seen a play performed, except for a few small productions the villagers had put together, generally under the watchful eye of the church, but he had read a great number, and had opinions on all of them—and Arthur had laughed, once, throwing his head back so that his hair caught the sunlight and held it close. Merlin had been appalled. Laughter did not seem appropriate: who could laugh, when they were all at war? Who could laugh when blood had been spilled—was still being spilled? He had withdrawn abruptly, retreated to his room with a stiff apology and drawn the curtains, but the sunlight would not leave him—the memory of the sunlight in Arthur’s hair, the blush it had given his high cheekbones.

He had not been able to shut himself away for long; some spark had begun to heat within him and would not be put out. They had exchanged books, stories—Merlin could not help but enjoy Arthur’s stories of his home, the father he revered, the mountains he had grown up in—and later, as inevitable, as easy as a sigh, they slipped into deeper confidences.

Merlin had kissed Arthur without thinking. They had been alone one evening, Merlin’s mother having retired for the night, leaving Merlin to watch Arthur smoke a lazy cigarette. Arthur had been staring thoughtfully at the ring he wore, his face distant and closed beyond the curling smoke, his shoulders uncharacteristically curled in on themselves as if bowed under some heavy thought, and Merlin had moved as if dreaming to brush his lips along the angles of Arthur’s jaw, feeling the barest scratch from the stubble there. 

He could not have said why he chose to do it, or even that he chose at all—he could only think that it had felt right. Arthur had turned to look at him, eyes gone wide, his face pale and shocked, and Merlin had felt an ugly flush rise in him, had begun to stutter his apology when Arthur had stubbed out the cigarette with trembling fingers and reached for him, placed warm hands on his face and returned the kiss, his lips soft on Merlin’s own. 

And if Merlin returned the kiss, what did that make him? What was Merlin—a dog cowed, groveling for scraps from the table of a cruel master? Merlin could not bear to think so. Arthur was not only a German but a man, the man who gave sweets to the neighbors’ children and made a habit of deliberately, subtly, overpaying the carpenter’s wife when word reached the village that her son had died in hospital. He was, yes, an officer, one who demanded absolute obedience and loyalty, barking commands in an unfamiliar tongue with a frightening expression, but when Merlin laid him beneath the pear tree—that terrible tree!—he had laughed as any other man laughs. He laughed, and kissed, and brought Merlin cigarettes and small trinkets and books, and Merlin had not the heart to tell him that he was won, that Arthur had no need to continue the campaign on soil that had long ago been conquered.

He still has not told Arthur, but he thinks Arthur must know—how can he not? When Merlin tucks a forget-me-not behind his ear, Arthur smiles, and wears a soft expression as he tugs on Merlin’s collar, pulling him down, pulling him close. They dare not do this often—they have already taken too many risks—but they cannot help themselves. Merlin often feels that his skin is pulled tight, dry and hot to the touch as it had been during his illness; Arthur is only another kind of fever, delirious and deadly. He lies awake when Arthur leaves at night for maneuvers, wracked by fear and guilt and desire, and resolves to treat Arthur as he ought from now on—he ought to forget Arthur, ignore him with a deference that borders on derision, take some small delight in cheating him on the price of a chicken or a loaf of bread—but by the time Arthur returns, weary and quiet, Merlin cannot help but lay hands on him, lay his head on Arthur’s shoulder so that they may both rest: two tired men who had been boys until the war had made them ancient.

:::

When they have the house to themselves—a rare occasion—or when they can escape to some other place, secure enough to protect their secrets, Arthur’s clear blue eyes turn hot and dark when he looks on Merlin, and Merlin reaches out, lays himself open entirely to Arthur. He tries to close his eyes, at first, but Arthur smoothes a hand over his hair, his neck; he whispers, “Merlin, Merlin,” the barest edge of a plea to it, and Merlin cannot, in the end, deny him anything.

They have learned each others’ bodies: Merlin has traced Arthur’s every bone with his tongue; Arthur knows exactly how to pull quiet, hoarse cries from the back of Merlin’s throat. He knows that a finger in Merlin to the knuckle will start a rumbling groan in Merlin’s chest; he has learned that his tongue will make Merlin gasp, muscles seizing and hips arching up for more. Merlin has never before been a loud lover—love, before Arthur, had always been something vaguely perplexing, a messier endeavor than he cared to participate in—but now he cannot stop the noises Arthur drives from him. He relishes the moans he traps behind his teeth when Arthur rubs a thumb over his nipples or his cock, the desperate, broken noises he makes when Arthur fucks him—or when Merlin pushes Arthur down and sits above him, rolling his hips in lazy circles until both of them are driven frantic with the waiting, the mad anticipation.

Arthur leaves him stretched open and made new, and Merlin loves best when they have an entire afternoon or a night to enjoy until dawn, because Arthur will roll on his side, once they have recovered, and urge Merlin’s thighs apart until he can see where he’s made Merlin wet and filthy. He will start with his fingers, slipping easily in the slick mess, but Merlin can never stand that for long, will scrabble with his fingers at Arthur’s shoulders and push his hips up fruitlessly and demand more—and Arthur will laugh, bending to catch Merlin’s words in his mouth with kisses, and obey.

:::

They speak of the future only distantly, couching it in the selfish abstractions of the young. Arthur says he would like to go back to school; he dreams of writing some great work, lecturing in a university somewhere. Merlin had never thought much about what will come: he has always assumed his life would follow the path laid out for him, a life confined to this village, this small square of insignificant land with all of the insignificant, beautiful souls who have known him since his birth. But Arthur stirs something hot and dangerous in him—he wants to see the cities Arthur talks of, wants to do more than look at pictures of the lands he has read of in his books. 

Neither of them dares speak the thought that is first in everyone’s mind: that the war drags on despite the summer’s peaceful breezes, that although the fall of France feels like the fall of the world, the fighting continues in other fields, spending other lives. One day these soldiers will be called back to the front: in Africa, perhaps, or on the shores of England. Everyone knows it; what more is there to say? 

They do not speak of what could happen to them were anyone to discover their affair, as if by denying a voice to those fears they might dissolve the very reality of the danger. They discuss patterns in the leaves instead, and Arthur hums Beethoven’s sonatas in Merlin’s ear late at night, so quiet as to be nearly silent. His voice is rich and deep, the room comfortingly shadowed. The radio is hidden with the china, and they have had no news beyond the birth of the grocer’s son that afternoon; it is easy, in the darkness, to forget that anything beyond the yellow papered walls exists—that anyone outside the small circle of light cast by the lamp could possibly reach them here. 

Merlin curls close to press his mouth to Arthur’s skin, and very carefully thinks of nothing at all. 

 

 

:::

_  
My dear it was a moment  
to clutch at for a moment  
so that you may believe in it  
and believing is the act of love, I think,  
even in the telling, wherever it went.  
(Anne Sexton)  
_

:::

_  
Even this late it happens:  
the coming of love, the coming of light.   
You wake and the candles are lit as if by themselves,   
stars gather, dreams pour into your pillows,   
sending up warm bouquets of air.  
Even this late the bones of the body shine   
and tomorrow's dust flares into breath.  
(Mark Strand)  
_

:::


End file.
